Ironwood promotes Dr Mark Currie

He moves up to chief scientific officer at the US pharma company

He previously led the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based company's R&D efforts, having joined the firm in 2002.

Prior to this he directed cardiovascular and central nervous system disease research as vice president of discovery research at Sepracor and before that served as director of arthritis and inflammation at Monsanto Company.

Ironwood's CEO Peter Hecht said: “Mark's outstanding contributions to Ironwood, including his expertise, leadership and superb judgment, are invaluable as we move our R&D efforts forward, growing our active pipeline and expanding our development efforts globally on behalf of our shareholders and the patients we aim to serve.”

Currie's academic research on the guanylate cyclase-C (GC-C) pathway laid the foundation for the discovery by Ironwood scientists of linaclotide.